(1) Field of the Invention
This invention relates to foods and more particularly to machines for preparing and cooking food impaled upon a stick.
(2) Description of the Prior Art
A corn dog is a weiner impaled upon a stick and coated with batter which is deep-fried to produce a crisp coating.
Prior to my invention corn dogs were made by inserting the sticks into weiners with a manually operated stick inserter and clamping a plurality of the sticks into a hand operated clamp. A worker grasped the clamp and dipped the food articles in batter. This worker had to be somewhat skilled in order to obtain the desired amount and distribution of batter around the weiner. The worker then placed the clamp on a moving conveyor system with the food articles immersed in hot grease.
After being immersed in the grease for an appropriate time, the clamps were removed manually from the conveyor system and the sticks manually unclamped therefrom. This manual system resulted in non-uniform corn dogs and high labor costs. JENKINS, U.S. Pat. No. 1,706,491, is an example of a cooker for cooking such corn dogs.
ROBB, U.S. Pat. No. 1,960,456, and GLASS, U.S. Pat. No. 3,648,625, disclose apparatuses for making frozen confections or novelties. The sticks of the novelties are clamped by a conveyor, conveyed to a dip tank, dipped in a coating substance, and conveyed to a freezing unit. ROBB employs a displacement of the chain and clamp to dip each of the confections independently and one at a time within the coating substance. GLASS employs a tilting mechanism to lower the confections singly from a raised position slightly below horizontal to a fully lowered position vertically downward to immerse the confections in the coated substance and then to raise the confections to the former lower than horizontal position to remove them from the dip tank.
STICKLE, U.S. Pat. No. 3,948,160, discloses a taco shell fryer in which the forms for holding the tortillas are lowered into hot grease for frying the tortillas. Likewise, WRIGHT ET AL, U.S. Pat. No. 2,585,364, dips frankfurters in batter and then conveys them into hot grease with appropriate displacements of the conveyor chain. Neither STICKLE nor WRIGHT employs sticks impaling the food articles suspended from clamps.
CHOW, U.S. Pat. No. 3,804,955, forms flat meat products in a corrugated form and inserts a stick therethrough. CHOW then serially dips the corrugated meat products suspended from sticks by a conveyor system into a coating substance with a displacement of the conveyor. With another displacement of the conveyor the meat product is lowered into a sauce bath and conveyed through an oven.
Applicant is also aware of SCHWEBS, U.S. Pat. No. 2,903,996 and French Patent S.E.I.L.A. No. 1,016,435 (1952).
LOWRANCE, U.S. Pat. No. 3,316,010 discloses a stick holder mechanism wherein sticks may be placed in elongated bar and held in place by an internal bar reciprocating longitudinally. LOWRANCE U.S. Pat. No. 4,069,960 issued Jan. 24, 1978 discloses an apparatus for inserting sticks into weiners. The weiners are clamped in a holder, and then the sticks are inserted through a stick holder bar and into the weiners. The stick holder bar is evidentally similar to the LOWRANCE U.S. Pat. No. 3,316,010 patent noted above.
Also, at the time this divisional application was filed, applicant was aware of patents to CLAY U.S. Pat. No. 2,552,621 and NOUEL U.S. Pat. No. 3,242,249 but do not consider them as pertinent as those specifically discussed above.
Applicant was also aware of the VOM DORP U.S. Pat. No. 4,080,716 issued Mar. 28, 1978, filed Apr. 25, 1977 and COTTRELL U.S. Pat. No. 4,130,936 issued Dec. 26, 1978 and filed Aug. 11, 1977. Applicant does not consider these two patents as pertinent as those noted and also would contest their being prior as to this application.